One of my favorite faces of TV visited campus last week. At the Q&A session, a student asked how he felt about CNN’s efforts to integrate web 2.0 into the current media platform. According to Cooper, all waking hours of the day are perceived by CNN execs as billable time, and so he’s constantly under pressure to Tweet, update his Facebook status, and blog. This is on top of the show and the live web casts that occur during commercial breaks. Then he also spends a lot of time responding to messages on a smartphone.
Cooper said he doesn’t spend a lot of time thinking about the business side of news. But it seems the business side spends an awful lot of energy taking up his. In my view, that’s exactly what’s going on: in order to stay current and competitive, the network is throwing any and all social media at its anchors.
I’ll be one of the first ones to embrace new social media tools and applications, but I am concerned about the overload and the potential for a serious backlash in the future. When is too much seriously too much? I’m already addicted to a cell phone without email. What’s going to be lost when we Tweet, blog, download, and sync our heads off? How do we find a balance?
With the surge in popularity, Twitter also has its critics, who claim the concept doesn’t add any depth or value. Afterall, who really cares what you’re doing 24/7 in short bursts of text? Personally, I’ve kind of struggled trying to break into the habit. As of right now, none of my friends follow me and I just feel like I’m tweeting off to no one. I have faith, however that the practice will soon come into place.
I think we’re currently undergoing a long digestion period. There are so many new and rising trends, along with frequent failures (I was a big fan of IWantSandy.com, a personal email/text messaging reminder service, and I’m disappointed that Jott.com is no longer actually free). New services have to add some sort of depth or value if they are to last.
And finally, I think not every new web 2.0/social media concept needs to be a colossal force of culture in order to be successful. I’m very interested in seeing more niche-services. One of my favorites is ChaCha.com — simply sign up online and text questions to “ChaCha.” ChaCha roams the web to find the answers to almost anything – from word definitions, to Abe Lincoln’s Birthday, to confirmations of celebrity gossip rumors. A quick look at the site’s Twitter-feed-like homepage shows (well, that Twitter’s officially conquering other forms of new media), and that the service seems to be thriving. But I don’t know anyone else that’s even heard of ChaCha. What’s your favorite niche service?
For more on Anderson Cooper’s Elon Visit, click here.
